MindanaoToday.com | DOH-10 sounds alarm as dengue cases spike
By: Uriel Quilinguing
The Department of Health Region 10 has renewed its call for massive search-and-destroy campaign against dengue-causing mosquitoes that had claimed 35 human lives in Northern Mindanao, even as the number of dengue cases went up 37 percent in the first five months this year, compared to the same period last year.
DOH-10 Entomologist Gemma G. Uy, in a forum in Cagayan de Oro on Friday, June 7, said their surveillance unit has so far recorded 7,332 dengue infections from January 1 to June 1, compared to 5,368 cumulative total of the first five months last year 2023, an increase of 1,954 dengue detections.
Of the region’s five provinces, Bukidnon posted the most dengue cases with 2,676, including 10 fatalities and its localities with relatively high incidence include Valencia, 331; Pangantucan, 240; Malaybalay, 238; and Maramag, 167.
Misamis Oriental tallied 1,435 dengue infections, including the 166 in Gingoog City, with four deaths. Misamis Occidental logged in 1,311 cases of dengue with 10 fatalities, including Oroquieta’s 277 and Ozamiz’ 197 dengue patients. Lanao del Norte had 821 dengue cases, including four deaths, while Camiguin had 140 dengue patients and two of them had died.
Of the region’s two highly-urbanized cities, Iligan had 522 incidence of dengue and two deaths while Cagayan de Oro had 437 dengue patients with three fatalities.
Uy said their data have debunked the notion that dengue fever is associated with the onset of the rainy season in the month of June because there has been a year-round detection of cases. Highest number of cases were posted on Week 4 and Week 12 of the epidemiological graph which mean these occur last weeks of January and March this year – periods when there was little or no rain at all due to the El Niño phenomenon.
She attributed this shift in the epidemiological characteristic of dengue-causing Aedes mosquitoes to climate change, aside from its being a container-breeder, low-flying, and day-biting insect. There has been a year-round detection of cases, she said, although dengue awareness activities are usually launched in June which, since 1998, has been observed as National Dengue Awareness Month.
Uy, a medical technologist, also announced they will distribute long-lasting insecticidal nets (LLIN) that are popularly known as Olyset Net to over a hundred pre-identified public elementary schools in the region, an activity the health department launched in 2012.
More than half of the dengue cases the past five months, as well as in previous years, belong to the 10-year-old and below age-group, most of them are school-age children. The median age has been 10 years old.
Uy said the health department is giving priority to kindergarten and those in Grades 1 to 3 for the Olyset Net, but she lamented that can only give a 25-meter roll of Olyset Net each school, enough to cover two standard-size classrooms. A roll of Olyset Net, which has to be imported, costs P14 thousand. (MT)
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